1. White Space Trials, Databases, and Applications
Paul W. Garnett
Director Technology Policy

2. Challenge: Growing Demand
24 HOURS
UPLOADED EVERY
60 SECONDS
20X - 40X
OVER THE NEXT
FIVE YEARS
50 BILLION
CONNECTED DEVICES
BY 2020
35X
2009 LEVELS
BY 2014
Video Uploads
Streaming Video Increasing Wireless Demand
Devices Proliferation*
Mobile Data Traffic**
*See Ericsson Press Release, quoting its President and Chief Executive Officer Hans Vestberg, April 13, 2010, available at
**. Federal Communications Commission, Staff Technical Paper, Mobile Broadband: The Benefits of Additional Spectrum, OBI Technical Paper No. 6 (Oct. 2010).

3. Challenge: Universal BB Access
2 Billion Internet Connected Consumers
555 Million Wired Broadband Subscribers
943 Million Wireless Broadband Subscribers
5 Billion
Cell Phones
*2010 Estimates: ITU World Telecommunications/ ICT Indicators database

4. Spectrum Policy Needs to Become More Nimble
Most Spectrum Is Not Used Most of the Time
We Are Experiencing Exponential Mobile Data Growth
We Need to Promote Technologies That Make More Efficient Use of Spectrum
Increasingly sophisticated online databases that automate spectrum allocation and use.
Wideband radios with sensing, channel notching, suppression, bonding, and other capabilities.

5. Our Ask of Policy Makers
We need policy makers to create opportunities for new technologies that are available today AND more nimble policy frameworks
We need policies that allow dynamic access to more spectrum across a range of bands, enabling complementary shorter-range and wide-area networks, and automated and adaptive solutions.
Powerful, yet inexpensive hardware and software technologies now offer new and more attractive solutions to our longstanding spectrum allocation problems (cognitive radios, online databases that automate spectrum allocation and data networks that can dynamically modulate their transmission power)
Adopting these advances will enhance the user experience by enabling literally billions of new devices as they go live over the course of the next decade on the Internet of Things.
TVWS is a FIRST STEP
The FCC’s TVWS regulations create a version one opportunity. Greater capabilities and spectrum bands can and should be enabled.

6. TV Band White Spaces Enable New Opportunities

7. White Spaces Trials & DemosWA NV TX VA NC
Isle of Bute
Helsinki
Completed or Ongoing
Cambridge
Japan
South Korea
Planned
Singapore

8. NAB Show, Las Vegas, Nevada
Xbox Live 1080p HD video streaming over TV white spaces spectrum. 
Used single 6 MHz channels supplied by MSR prototype database.
Simulated licensed wireless microphone registration, showing seamless channel changing.
Consistent throughput of approx. 8.8 Mbps downstream and approx. 2.3 Mbps upstream. 
Long range links established from the Wynn and Hilton Hotels miles and .5 miles, respectively.    
Achieved throughput of 5 Mbps downstream and 2 Mbps upstream on .8 mile link.

9. Cambridge, England Trial Objectives
Assess the potential of TV white spaces to:
Deliver cost-efficient broadband access to rural communities
Offload wireless data demand in urban centres and
Open the way for innovative business models.
Test and measurement program to help inform Ofcom’s regulatory proceedings.

10. Trial Partners

11. Trial Overview Overview
Multiple use cases: Location based services, machine-to-machine, local content delivery, rural broadband.
Wide area coverage: When completed, 17 base stations will cover much of the city centre and some surrounding areas.
Unprecedented industry partnership: Arqiva, BBC, BT, BSkyB, Cambridge Consultants, CRFS, Neul, Nokia, TTP, Samsung. More to come.
Multiple hardware suppliers: Adaptrum, KTS, Neul, and 6Harmonics.
Multiple whitespaces databases: Microsoft and Spectrum Bridge.
Government support: Test licenses approved with cooperation of Ofcom. Local government support.
The Cambridge trial will be of unprecedented scope, both in terms of the partnership and the use cases.